Crypto Tax Evasion

Tom G. Meling; Magne Mogstad; Arnstein Vestre

doi:10.3386/w32865

Crypto Tax Evasion

Tom G. Meling, Magne Mogstad & Arnstein Vestre

Working Paper 32865

DOI 10.3386/w32865

Issue Date August 2024

We quantify the extent of crypto tax noncompliance and evasion, and assess the efficacy of alternative tax enforcement interventions. The context of the study is Norway. This context allows us to address key measurement challenges by combining de-anonymized crypto trading data with individual tax returns, survey data, and information from tax enforcement interventions. We find that crypto tax noncompliance is pervasive, even among investors trading on exchanges that share identifiable trading data with tax authorities. However, since most crypto investors owe little in crypto-related taxes, enforcement strategies need to be well-targeted or cheap for benefits to outweigh costs.

We thank Zahi Ben-David, Lin William Cong, Alessandro Melone, Antoinette Schoar and seminar participants at the Norwegian School of Economics for helpful comments. We are grateful to the Norwegian Tax Administration, and especially Torhild Henriksen and Inger Helen Karset, as well as K33 Research, and especially Vetle Lunde, for providing data access and institutional details. Elijah Broadbent, Seiwoong Hong, and Zelin Li have provided excellent research assistance. Mogstad gratefully acknowledges support from The Research Council of Norway, projects no. 341250 (Norwegian Fiscal Studies) and 295901. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research.
MARC RIS BibTeΧ

Crypto Tax Evasion

Related

Topics

Programs

Working Groups

More from NBER